He sold our old house within months of my moving into my new apartment, and it left a searing pain in my already shattered heart. If I’d thought there was any way I could have convinced him to leave, I would have stayed there for all eternity. I had memories in that house. Memories with Manda. I could care less about the rest of them.
Manda and I did everything together. She used to bring her clothes over and get ready at my house almost every weekend. It worked out for everyone. Brett would go over to Caleb’s and they’d watch sports for a few hours while we talked and got ready for whatever we had planned for that evening. There were physical reminders in that house too—like the black spot on our bedroom carpet. If I close my eyes tight, I can still hear Manda’s laughter when she spilled that nail polish. If she were here, she would say that I slapped it out of her hand in mid-stroke. She also would be right. Friends don’t let friends paint their nails black in August. She tried to make me clean it up so Brett wouldn’t get mad, but we were both laughing so hard that it had almost dried by the time I pulled myself up off the floor.
God, I miss her so much.
But today’s not about Manda. Today is about Brett.
I hate him. On the outside, he’s a really nice guy. I can see how I once fell in love with him. But I’m not the only one who changed after the wreck. Brett’s basically unrecognizable these days. He’s always so needy and harassing me about something.
"Sarah, did you pay your electric bill?"
"Sarah, did you take your medicine?"
"Sarah, did you eat yesterday?"
What the actual fuck is wrong with him? I’m thirty-three years old. I don’t need a babysitter. The whole fucking world treats me like a child and it’s so damn frustrating. He’s just another prick who always talks down to me and refuses to let me live my own God damn life.
But I have to hold on to him.
Brett’s all I have left, and that speaks volumes to how screwed up my life truly is. He’s finally trying to move on with this Jesse chick. I just can’t in good conscience allow that to happen. I don’t love Brett, not even a tiny bit, but I need him to love me. I spend all day every day wanting nothing more than to be alone, but when the sun goes down, the solitude becomes terrifying. My mind races and images of Manda lying dead on the highway invade my every thought. I never actually saw that visual, but that doesn’t mean it’s not branded into the backs of my eyelids. My overactive imagination is a cruel bitch. I have even conjured up a whole scene from the night of the wreck where I get trashed and laugh as I drive directly toward the tree.
Yet, every Thursday night, Brett shows up at my house and the world inside my mind goes quiet for a few hours. I focus on slinging all of my pent-up pain at him. It releases some of the constantly building pressure that threatens to overtake me. I know my words kill him, but it’s better him than me. Each time he visits, he always leaves just like I want him to. Hell, I spend hours trying to force him to leave. But he always comes back. It’s Brett’s biggest flaw and greatest attribute.
I don’t know why I picked today to come over to Brett’s apartment. But I woke up this morning feeling even more on edge than usual. I’ve been hiding out in my room since the seven-layer-dip fiasco a few weeks ago. The sound of his words still rings in my ears.
"There will never be another Brett and Sarah Sharp."
The best part was the look on his face when he said it. I honestly had to fight back a laugh. It was as if that were the very first time he ever admitted it to himself. We haven’t been together in four years, and he is just now catching on to this? And they say I’m the one who suffered a brain injury.
I laugh to myself as I swing open Brett’s front door, quickly locking it behind me. If I’m going to be successful in my plan to break him and Jesse up, I’m going to have to give her doubts that Brett can’t talk himself out of. I’d known that the appearance at the coffee shop probably wouldn’t be enough, but it was just too damn easy. His sisters still have my old e-mail address on their family e-mail distro. They send what feels like a million pictures a day. It was all too easy to print out that picture of Brett’s niece. She looks just freaking like him. It’s definitely not a stretch to believe she could be his child. When I slammed it down on the table that day at Nell’s coffee shop, I thought Jesse’s eyes were going to bulge out of her head.
However, Brett clearly managed to weasel his way out of that one. Now, it’s time to step this up a bit. I reach into my purse, pull out one of my earrings, and toss it under the pillow on the couch. Just so there is no doubt about who it belongs to, I picked the same ones I wore the first time I met Jesse.
Damn it. I really liked that pair too.
I then move to the bathroom and search through the drawers. Just as I hoped, I find a few women’s toiletries. I pull a handwritten note from my purse and begin to search for somewhere to hide it. Just for good measure, I grab the pink toothbrush before shoving them both in the drawer.